"All this region is very level and full of forests, vines and butternut trees. No Christian has ever visited this land and we had all the misery of the world trying to paddle the river upstream." Samuel de Champlain

My translation of above article. (My question is: they won't listen to us taxpayers and voters. Will they listen to them?)

Oil drilling - The Natives want to protect the Gulf of St. Lawrence.

The Innu First Nation, Maliseet and Mi'kmaq of Quebec and the Maritimes are against oil exploration in the Gulf of St. Lawrence and intend to act to prove so, the Devoir has heard. The group, against the Couillard government rush to go ahead in this file, thinks that a recent judgement ruling of the Supreme court gives the Natives some rights over this ancestral land."

On top of having a meeting in Halifax so they can "talk with one voice" in favor of protecting the Gulf, the First Nations will send a boat flotilla Wednesday that will symbolically occupy the Old Harry region. This underwater structure is sought after because of it hypothetical potential for black oil.

"Our Nations want to send a clear message saying that there will not be any drilling in the Gulf. We also want to send a message for the protection of the Gulf of St. Lawrence and its importance for the First Nations", explained Chief of the Councel of the Innus of Ekuanitshit, Jean-Charles Piétacho, Tuesday.

The Native representatives think that fishing must be more taken into account in the debate around the estimated economic spin-off of an eventual exploitation of fossil fuels. In the Ekuanitshit community alone, at least some hundred jobs depend on fisheries directly.

"A spill would have irreversible impact on the fishing industry", says Claude Jeannote, chief of the Mi'kmaq community of Gespeg. For the 3 Mi'kmaq communities of the Gaspésie Peninsula, fishing represents annual benefits of $72 million. As for the Gulf in its entirety, the value is over $1,5 billion a year. As for tourism, the spin-offs add up to more than $800 million.

"We are not against economic development, says Mr Jeannotte. But it must not be done at the futur generations' expense that would lose the Gulf's wealth."

Quebec's silence

Chiefs Piétacho and Jeannotte think the problem is that the political decision-makers completely ignore the First Nations opinion in the oil debate in marine zones.

"The Quebec and Newfoundland governments act as if we do not exist. We are not consulted, says Jean-Charles Piétacho. Moreover, they thread in unknown territory. They want to do economic development at the expense of the environment, when we do not have the capability to protect the Gulf or intervene in case of a spill."

A Strategic Environmental Assessment (ÉES) done by Genivar that the Quebec Liberal government had asked for had mentioned exactly those lapses of information concerning the Gulf, but also the oil industry's in marine zones. These are about exploration and exploitation techniques, the composition of the physical, biological and human areas, and the impacts of spills.

Quebec would then be incapable of responding to an oil spill in a marine environment. "The capacity of intervention in case of an accidental spill out at sea is deficient right now to be able to respond to eventual major accidents, even those that could involve the existing maritime transportation", says the 800 page report published in September 2013. We also do not now how to recuperate the oil "when there is ice present". We know relatively few thing about "the currents and their evolution along with climate change".

But a spill from a maritime oil exploitation in the Old Harry sector would not only threaten the whole eastern part of the Gulf of St. Lawrence, but also the Magdalen Islands, reported the first independent scientific study on the subject. And for now, the oil companies' responsibility in case of a disaster is limited to $30 million. The Federal wants to increase that to one billion. The Gulf of Mexico disaster cost more than $40 billion.

The assessment done by Genivar also notes the necessity to consider the Gulf of St. Lawrence as one whole entity. Right now, Newfoundland is having its own environmental assessment without Quebec's participation. But the Old Harry structure is located right at the maritime border between the 2 provinces. If a black tide happens, five provinces may receive some pollution.

Ancestral rights

In spite of all the dangers listed by the science, the Philippe Couillard government is still determined to go forward. It intends to negotiate this fall, during the just recently announced ÉES, a "mirror" bill that will plan "the conditions for the development of hydrocarbons in the Gulf of St. Lawrence (common zone management), including the Old Harry geological structure".

On the Newfoundland side, the exploratory drilling is progressing, but up to now, none have been done in the Old Harry sector where only Corridor Resources has exploratory permits. Preliminary assessments estimated the presence of 2 billion barrels of oil at the sea bottom, based mostly on seismic soundings. Indeed, no exploitable oil resource has yet to be found in the Gulf, even after decades of exploration made by different oil companies.

The First Nations intend to have their rights recognized in the Gulf of St. Lawrence region. The recent Supreme Court ruling in their favor regarding development activities in their "ancestral" territory gives them hope.

"The Supreme Court was very clear about the governments' obligation to discuss with the First Nations before any project on their ancestral land, said Chief Claude Jeannotte. It also mentioned the necessity of obtaining their consent when a project risks of affecting their ancestral rights. That is exactly the case with the oil projects in the Gulf of St. Lawrence."

"They will no longer be able to ignore their obligations, added Chief Jean-Charles Piétacho. The message is very clear: First Nations must be consulted."

I'm the second generation of my family that lives in Richelieu, Quebec, in Canada. My family tree, both from my mother's and my father's side, has its roots in Quebec since the beginning of the 1600s: my ancestors crossed the ocean from France, leaving Perche and Normandy behind them. Both French AND English are my mother tongues: I learned to talk in both languages when I was a baby, and both my parents were perfectly bilingual too.